Although the president’s
give an important countervoice to the well-armed jihadist commanders who in many places have set
the pace of the fighting and created worries that Islamists will gain a permanent
hold. An important change in the new agreement is that revolutionary councils
from 14 Syrian provinces now each have a representative, though not all live in
Syria. The hope is that will bind the coalition to those inside the country. His
first trip outside Washington to engage the public will come after Thanksgiving, since Mr. Obama
is scheduled to leave next weekend on a diplomatic trip to Asia. Travel plans are
still sketchy, partly because his December calendar is full of the traditional holiday
parties. Democrats said the White House’s strategy of focusing both inside and outside
of Washington was smart. “You want to avoid getting sucked into the Beltway
inside-baseball games,” said Joel Johnson, a former adviser in the Clinton White House
and the Senate. “You can still work toward solutions, but make sure you get out of
Washington while you are doing that. Although the president’s majority
shrank nationally, he won a larger proportion of Latino and Asian votes than in
2008. Among Latinos, Mr. Romney’s share of the vote fell 17 percentage points below
the 44 percent won by George W. Bush in 2004. Perhaps most ominous, the Latino share of the total
vote rose to 10 percent from 8 percent in 2004, and the Asian share rose to 3 percent
from 2 percent. The electorate is now 28 percent nonwhite, more than double the figure
from two decades ago. That growth is certain to continue; in 2011, births to nonwhites
outnumbered births to whites for the first time. After three days of haggling at a luxury hotel
here, opposition negotiators agreed to the new coalition and then elected as its
president Sheikh Ahmad Moaz al-Khatib.